THE EIGHTH DISCUSSION

To refute their theory that the existence of the First is simple, namely
that it is pure existence and that its existence stands in relation to no
quiddity and to no essence, but stands to necessary existence as do other
beings to their quiddity

Ghazali says:

There are two ways of attacking this theory. The first is to
demand a proof and to ask how you know this, through the necessity of the
intellect, or through speculation and not by immediate necessity; and in any
case you must tell us your method of reasoning.

If it is said that, if the First had a quiddity, its existence
would be related to it, and would be consequent’ on this quiddity and would be
its necessary attribute, and the consequent is an effect and therefore
necessary existence would be an effect, and this is a contradiction, we answer:
This is to revert to the source of the confusion in the application of the term
‘necessary existence’, for we call this entity ‘reality’ or ‘quiddity’ and this
reality exists, i. e. it is not non-existent and is not denied, but its
existence is brought into a relation with it, and if you like to call this
‘consequent’ and ‘necessary attribute’, we shall not quibble about words, if
you have once acknowledged that it has no agent for its existence and that this
existence has not ceased to be eternal and to have no efficient cause; if,
however, you understand by ‘consequent’ and ‘effect’ that it has an efficient
cause, this is not true. But if you mean something else, this is conceded, for
it is not impossible, z since the demonstration proves only the end of a causal
series and its ending in an existent reality; a positive quiddity, therefore,
is possible, and there is no need to deny the quiddity.

If it is said: Then the quiddity becomes a cause for the
existence which is consequent on it, and the existence becomes an effect and an
object of the act, we answer: The quiddity in temporal things is not a cause of
their existence, and why should it therefore be the case in the eternal, if you
mean by ‘cause’ the agent? But if you mean something else by it, namely that
without which it could not be, let that be accepted, for there is nothing
impossible in it; the impossibility lies only in the infinite causal series,
and if this series only comes to a final term, then the impossibility is
cancelled; impossibility can be understood only on this point, therefore you
must give a proof of its impossibility.

All the proofs of the philosophers are nothing but presumptions
that the term has a sense from which certain consequences follow, and nothing
but the supposition that demonstration has in fact proved a necessary existent
with the meaning the philosophers ascribed to it. We have, however, shown
previously that this is not true. In short, this proof of the philosophers
comes down to the proof of the denial of attributes and of the division into
genus and specific difference; only this proof is still more ambiguous and
weak, for this plurality is purely verbal, for the intellect does allow the
acceptance of one single existent quiddity. The philosophers, however, say that
every existent quiddity is a plurality, for it contains quiddity and existence,
and this is an extreme confusion; for the meaning of a single existent is
perfectly understandable-nothing exists which has no essence, and the
existence of an essence does not annul its singleness.

I say:

Ghazali does not relate
Avicenna’s doctrine literally as he did in his book The Aims of the Philosophers.
‘ For since Avicenna believed that the existence of a thing indicated an
attribute additional to its essence, he could no longer admit that its essence
was the agent of its existence out of the possibles, for then the thing would
be the cause of its own existence and it would not have an agent. It follows
from this, according to Avicenna, that everything which has an existence
additional to its essence has an efficient cause, and since according to
Avicenna the First has no agent, it follows necessarily that its existence is
identical with its essence. z And therefore Ghazali’s
objection that Avicenna assimilates existence to a necessary attribute of the
essence is not true, because the essence of a thing is the cause of its
necessary attribute and it is not possible that a thing should be the cause of
its own existence, because the existence of a thing is prior to its quiddity.
To identify the quiddity and the existence of a thing is not to do away with
its quiddity, as Ghazali asserts, but is only
the affirmation of the unity of quiddity and existence. If we regard existence
as an accidental attribute of the existent, and it is the agent which gives
possible things their existence, necessarily that which has no agent either
cannot have an existence (and this is absurd), or its existence must be
identical with its essence.

But the whole of this
discussion is built on the mistake that the existence of a thing is one of its
attributes. For the existence which in our knowledge is prior to the quiddity
of a thing is that which signifies the true. Therefore the question whether a
thing exists, either (i) refers to that which has a cause that determines its
existence, and in that case its potential meaning is to ask whether this thing
has a cause or not, according to Aristotle at the beginning of the second chapter
of the Posterior Analytics;s or (2)
it refers to that which has no cause, and then its meaning is to ask whether a
thing possesses a necessary attribute which determines its existence. ‘ And
when by ‘existent’ is meant what is understood by ‘thing’ and ‘entity’, it
follows the rule of the genus which is predicated analogically, and whatever it
is in this sense is attributed in the same way to that which has a cause and to
that which has none, and it does not signify anything but the concept of the
existent, and by this is meant ‘the true’, and if it means something additional
to the essence, it is only in a subjective sense which does not exist outside
the soul except potentially, as is also the case with the universal. And this
is the way in which the ancient philosophers considered the First Principle,
and they regarded it as a simple existent. As to the later philosophers in
Islam, they stated that, in their speculation about the nature of the existent qua existent, they were led to accept a
simple existent of this description.

The best method to
follow, in my opinion, and the nearest to strict proof, is to say that the
actualization of existents which have in their substance a possible existence
necessarily occurs only through an actualizer which is in act, i. e. acting,
and moves them and draws them out of potency into act. And if this actualizer
itself is also of the nature of the possible, i. e. possible in its substance,
there will have to be another actualizer for it, necessary in its substance and
not possible, so that this sublunary world may be conserved, and the nature of
the possible causes may remain everlastingly, proceeding without end. And if
these causes exist without end, as appears from their nature, and each of them
is possible, necessarily their cause, i. e. that which determines their
permanence, must be something necessary in its substance, and if there were a
moment in which nothing was moved at all, there would be no possibility of an
origination of movements The nexus between temporal existence and eternal can
only take place without a change affecting the First through that movement
which is partly eternal, partly temporal. b And the thing moved by this
movement is what Avicenna calls ‘the existence necessary through another’, and this
‘necessary through another’ must be a body everlastingly moved, and in this way
it is possible that the essentially temporal and corruptible should exist in
dependence on the eternal, and this through approach to something and through
recession from it, as you observe it happen to transitory existents in relation
to the heavenly bodies. ? And since this moved body is necessary in its
substance, possible in its local movement, it is necessary that the process
should terminate in an absolutely necessary existent in which there is no
potency at all, either in its substance, or locally or in any of the other
forms of movement; and that which is of this description is necessarily simple,
because if it were a compound, it would be possible, not necessary, and it
would require a necessary existent. And this method of proving it is in my
opinion sufficient, and it is true.

However, what Avicenna
adds to this proof by saying that the possible existent must terminate either
in an existent necessary through another or in an existent necessary through
itself, and in the former case that the necessary through another should be a
consequence of the existent necessary through itself, for he affirms that the
existent necessary through another is in itself a possible existent and what is
possible needs something necessary-this addition, is to my mind
superfluous and erroneous, for in the necessary, in whatever way you suppose
it, there is no possibility whatsoever and there exists nothing of a single
nature of which it can be said that it is in one way possible and in another
way necessary in its existence. ‘ For the philosophers have proved that there
is no possible whatsoever in the necessary; for the possible is the opposite of
the necessary, and the only thing that can happen is that a thing should be in
one way necessary, in another way possible, as they believed for instance to be
the case with the heavenly body or what is above the body of the heavens,
namely that it was necessary through its substance and possible in its movement
and in space. What led Avicenna to this division was that he believed that the
body of the heavens was essentially necessary through another, possible by
itself, and we have shown in another place that this is not true. And the proof
which Avicenna uses in dealing with the necessary existent, when this
distinction and this indication are not made, is of the type of common
dialectical notions; when, however, the distinction is made, it is of i the
type of demonstrative proof.

You must know further
that the becoming of which the Holy Law speaks is of the kind of empirical
becoming in this world, and this occurs in the forms of the existents which the
Ash’arites call mental qualitiesand the philosophers call forms, and this
becoming occurs only through another thing and in time, and the Holy Words:
‘Have not those who have disbelieved considered that the heavens and the earth
were coherent, and we have rent them . . . ‘and the Divine Words ‘then he
straightened himself up to the sky which was smoke . . . ‘, refer to this. But
as to the relation which exists between the nature of the possible existent and
the necessary existent, about this the Holy Law is silent, because it is too
much above the understanding of the common man and knowledge of it is not
necessary for his blessedness. When the Ash’arites affirm that the nature of
the possible’ is created and has come into existence in time out of nothing (a
notion which all the philosophers oppose, whether they believe in the temporal
beginning of the world or not), they do not say this, if you consider the
question rightly, on the authority of the law of Islam, and there is no proof
for it. What appears from the Holy Law is the commandment to abstain from
investigating that about which the Holy Law is silent, and therefore it is said
in the Traditions: ‘The people did not cease thinking till they said: God has
created this, but who has created God? And the Prophet said: When one of you
finds this, this is an act of pure faith’, and in another version: ‘When one of
you finds this, let him read the verse of the Qur’an: Say, He, God is one. And
know that for the masses to turn to such a question comes from the whisperings
of Satan and therefore the prophet said: This is an act of pure faith.

Ghazali says:

The second way is to say that an existence without quiddity or
essence cannot be conceived, and just as mere non-existence, without a
relation to an existent the non-existence of which can be supposed,
cannot be conceived, in the same way existence can be only conceived in
relation to a definite essence, especially when it is defined as a single
essence; for how could it be defined as single, conceptually differentiated
from others, if it had not a real essence? For to deny the quiddity is to deny
the real essence, and when you deny the real essence of the existent, the
existent can no longer be understood. It is as if the philosophers affirmed at
the same time existence and a non-existent, which is contradictory. This
is shown by the fact that, if it were conceivable, it would be also possible in
the effects that there should be an existence without an essence, participating
with the First in not having a real essence and a quiddity, differing from it
in having a cause, whereas the First is causeless. And why should such an
effect not be imagined? And is there any other reason for this than that it is
inconceivable in itself? But what is inconceivable in itself does not become
conceivable by the denial of its cause, nor does what is conceivable become
inconceivable because it is supposed to have a cause. Such an extreme negation
is the most obscure of their theories, although they believe indeed that they
have proved what they say. Their doctrine ends in absolute negation, and indeed
the denial of the quiddity is the denial of the real essence, and through the
denial of this reality nothing remains but the word ‘existence’, which has no
object at all when it is not related to a quiddity. ‘

And if it is said: ‘Its real essence is that it is the
necessary, and the necessary is its quiddity’, we answer: ‘The only sense of
“necessary” is “causeless”, and this is a negation which does not constitute a
real essence; and the denial of a cause for the real essence presupposes the
real essence, and therefore let the essence be conceivable, so that it can be
described as being causeless; but the essence cannot be represented as non-existent,
since “necessity” has no other meaning than “being causeless”. ‘ Besides, if
the necessity were added to the existence, this would form a plurality; and if
it is not added, how then could it be the quiddity? For the existence is not
the quiddity, and thus what is not added to the existence cannot be the
quiddity either. ‘

I say:

This whole paragraph is
sophistry. For the philosophers do not assume that the First has an existence
without a quiddity and a quiddity without an existence. They believe only that
the existence in the compound is an additional attribute to its essence and it
only acquires this attribute through the agent, and they believe that in that
which is simple and causeless this attribute is not additional to the quiddity
and that it has no quiddity differentiated from its existence; but they do not
say that it has absolutely no quiddity, as he assumes in his objection against
them.

Having assumed that they
deny the quiddity-which is false Ghazali
begins now to charge them with reprehensible theories and says:

If this were conceivable it would also be possible in the
effects that there should be an existence without an essence, participating
with the First in not having a real essence.

I say:

But the philosophers do
not assume an existent absolutely without a quiddity: they only assume that it
has not a quiddity like the quiddities of the other existents; and this is one
of the sophistical fallacies, for the term ‘quiddity’ is ambiguous, and this
assumption, and everything built upon it, is a sophistical argument, for the
non-existent cannot be described either by denying or by affirming something of it. And Ghazali, by fallacies of the kind perpetrated in this
book, is not exempt from wickedness or from ignorance, and he seems nearer to
wickedness than to ignorance-or should we say that there is a necessity
which obliged him to do this?

And as to his remark,
that the meaning of ‘necessary existent’ is , causeless’, this is not true, but
our expression that it is a necessary existent has a positive meaning,
consequent on a nature which has absolutely no cause, no exterior agent, and no
agent which is part of it.

And as to Ghazali’s words:

If the necessity were added to the existence, this would form a
plurality; and if it is not added, how then could it be the quiddity? For
existence is not the quiddity, and thus what is not added to the existence
cannot be the quiddity either.

I say:

According to the
philosophers necessity is not an attribute added to the essence, and it is
predicated of the essence in the same way as we say of it that it is inevitable
and eternal. ‘ And likewise if we understand by ‘existence’ a mental attribute,
it is not an addition to the essence, but if we understand it as being an
accident, in the way Avicenna regards it in the composite existent, then it
becomes difficult to explain how the uncompounded can be the quiddity itself,although one might say perhaps: ‘In the way
the knowledge in the uncompounded becomes the knower himself. ‘ If, however,
one regards the existent as the true, all these doubts lose their meaning, and
likewise, if one understands ‘existent’ as having the same sense as ‘entity’,
and according to this it is true that the existence in the uncompounded is the
quiddity itself.